Walton Goggins faced one of his worst fears while filming The White Lotus—and ended up in the hospital because of it.
The actor, who portrays Rick in the Emmy-winning series, suffered a snake bite while shooting a dramatic scene, sending him to a local medical facility for treatment.
Goggins revealed the shocking incident during an appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live, where he described his intense fear of snakes and the chaos that unfolded on set.
“I don’t just have a phobia – it’s like a missing link when it comes to snakes. I am terrified of snakes — really, really terrified — and there’s something, like, genetically wrong with me when it comes to snakes,” he admitted.
The accident occurred during a scene where his character experiences a drug-fueled meltdown at a snake show, leading him to recklessly open the cages. Prior to filming, a snake handler walked Goggins through which snakes were venomous. However, in the heat of the moment, panic took over.
“All I’m thinking about is the very first cage where the snake will kill you — ‘don’t open that’ — and then the rest of it just goes out of my mind. And then they yelled action, and it’s like, ‘Okay, don’t open the first one because it’ll kill you.’ The next one, ‘Was it green or was it brown? Which one has a big, big bite?'” he recalled.
Unfortunately, Goggins grabbed the wrong snake—a green one that was less than pleased with his handling. “As I was pulling the snake out, he didn’t wanna come, right? And so he turns around and he bit me.” His reaction was anything but cool: “Oh my God, I’ve been bit by a snake! Oh my God!”
Despite the ordeal, the production crew initially brushed it off. “They put a little Neosporin on it, and we kept going for the next nine hours,” he said.
However, the next day, a producer suggested he visit the hospital just to be safe. “I said, ‘For what? You said the snake was nonvenomous, right? Am I dying a slow death? Is there something you know I don’t know?'”
Ultimately, he went to the hospital and got a tetanus shot. “So, in other words, they got a call from the lawyers at HBO,” Kimmel joked.
Goggins agreed, laughing, “That’s exactly what happened. And they made me sign that day! Somebody just kinda came up — ‘I’m sorry you’re not feeling too good. Listen, can you just sign this little bitty piece of paper?’ I thought, ‘You want my autograph, or I’ve just lost all of my rights?'”
Reflecting on the experience, Goggins described the two-day shoot as “a horror show.” He added, “It was two days of like, ‘I can’t, I can’t, I can’t,’ and they had somebody right off camera, as soon as I would pick a snake up, I’d bring it over and put it in their arms like, ‘Oh my God,’ and almost f—ing pass out every time.”
Despite the harrowing experience, Goggins powered through—proving that even the biggest fears won’t stop him from delivering a gripping performance on The White Lotus.
